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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25959319">The Impossible Campfire</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheStrangeSeaWolf/pseuds/TheStrangeSeaWolf'>TheStrangeSeaWolf</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Campfires, Clever Thing, Fluff, Gen, Marshmallows, Song: All You Need Is Love, saving the universe</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 08:42:46</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,178</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25959319</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheStrangeSeaWolf/pseuds/TheStrangeSeaWolf</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>So, @GrafEdelweis (graf-edel-weiss on tumblr) posted this wonderful artwork on twitter and wrote "Oh and If you write fanfiction based on this please send me a link it will make me happy!"<br/>It was all the prompt my mind needed...</p><p>A translation into Russian <a href="https://ficbook.net/readfic/10023406">is available here</a>.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Doctors &amp; Companions</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>35</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The Impossible Campfire</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <a href="https://twitter.com/GrafEdelweis">
    
  </a>
</p><p>“This shouldn’t have been possible!” The first Doctor grabbed his lapels, staring up to the millions of falling stars. Technically, those weren’t falling stars but the remnants of a gigantic explosion, but it looked nice, anyway.</p><p>“Well, it was, as you very well saw.” The sixth Doctor grabbed his lapels, too, joining the older – or younger? – incarnation in admiring the sky.</p><p>“If my impossible girl Clara is into something, nothing is impossible,” the eleventh Doctor smiled, rectifying his bowtie, squinting.</p><p>“Clara who?” The twelfth Doctor frowned, letting his hand run through his impressive grey curls. “I only know that Bill is with them, so, if this exceeds imagination, it is probably down to her.”</p><p>“No one knows how to blow up a Death Star like <em>my</em> Ace, that’s for sure,” the seventh Doctor remarked, crossing his arms, staring proudly at the falling stars.</p><p>“It’s not <em>that</em> impossible,” the third Doctor explained, “you just reverse the polarity of the neutron flow of the Death Star, then send all our companions with the TARDIS to the other end of the universe and then…”</p><p>“…ka-boom!” Added the thirteenth Doctor, smiling excited, gesticulating widely.</p><p>“Fantastic!” The ninth Doctor grinned.</p><p>“That plan of yours… it sounded rather complicated,” the first Doctor eyed first the third, then all the other Doctors who had now gathered around him, “I just hope that your companions are smart enough to execute it properly!”</p><p>“They got Sarah Jane!” The third, fourth and tenth Doctor exclaimed immediately.</p><p>“And Adric did the calculations, they can’t go wrong!” The fifth Doctor remarked.</p><p>“And they got Rose!” The ninth and the tenth Doctors immediately added.</p><p>“And Jo”, “Romana!”, “Donna!”, “Amy and Rory!”, “Peri!”, “Grace!”, “Nissa”, “Rick… Mickey”, “Yaz!”, “Tegan!”, “Jamie!”, “K9!”, “Martha!”, “Mel!”, “Liz!”, soon nobody understood a word anymore because all the Doctors pushed their companion forward, adding their specific abilities that would help saving the universe.</p><p>“Shut up! Shut up! Shut all up! I can’t hear myself thinking!”</p><p>The twelfth Doctor bellowed so loud and angry that all the other Doctors stopped quarrelling and looked to him.</p><p>“Thinking is not you strong suit anyway, Gramps,” the tenth Doctor grinned.</p><p>“Don’t you have a sandbox to play in, <em>Sandshoes Me</em>?” The twelfth Doctor shot back, frowning so hard everybody feared his attack eyebrows would fall off. Ten opened his mouth for a reply, but Twelve cut him off. “If I understood <em>TV Host Me</em> and <em>Female Me</em> right…”</p><p>“Oi, not <em>FEMALE</em> <em>Me</em>, you stupid, old, white <em>MALE</em>!” The thirteenth Doctor met the twelfth’s attack eyebrows with equally angry attack eyebrows.</p><p>“Who do you call ‘<em>TV Host Me</em>’?” The third, fifth, sixth, eight and eleventh Doctor demanded to know, confused if they should be offended or not.</p><p>To everyone’s surprise Twelve shrunk by several inches under Thirteen’s angry stare.</p><p>“Sorry, Ma’am, I didn’t mean to offend you… So, if <em>TV Host Me</em> and <em>Rainbow Me</em> are right, we are stuck on this impossible planet until our companions have managed to destroy the Death Star and have rectified the lever of the universe again, right?”</p><p>“Precisely,” the third Doctor said, brushing a lint no one else could see from his green velvet coat, “we now have to wait here until our companions sweep us away with the TARDIS the moment this planet will disappear because it isn’t needed to balance out the universe anymore. Then, there is this short moment, where we can split up and be brought back into our distinct timelines. A second too early, the whole universe will spiral out of control, a moment too late and…”</p><p>“We all go pooooof!” The thirteenth Doctor exclaimed, grinning like a maniac.</p><p>All the other Doctors stared at her in horror.</p><p>“What? Come on, where is your spirit of adventure?” She grinned. “I don’t recall me being such a coward, all of me. Besides, they have Yaz, Ryan and Graham, they will manage it on time!”</p><p>The first Doctor cleared his throat.</p><p>“Well, then, it seems all we can do is wait, right? Any ideas what we could do in the meanwhile?”</p><p>The second Doctor pulled out his flute and started playing <em>Lord of the Dance</em>. The eighth and ninth Doctors started dancing to it, Eight with something that closely resembled Irish tap dancing, Nine with something that resembled <em>anything but </em>Irish tap dancing.</p><p>The fourth Doctor sighed, pulled a bag of jelly babies from his coat, and thoughtfully munched one. The sixth Doctor sneaked up behind him and stole one from him. They started quarrelling.</p><p>“Hey… how about a campfire?” The thirteenth Doctor exclaimed, eyes glowing wide and excited. “I love campfires!”</p><p>“With roasted marshmallows?” The twelfth Doctor asked, all anger suddenly gone, eyes glistering hopefully like the eyes of a four-year-old.</p><p>The fourth and seventh Doctors both started searching their pockets frantically, Four pulling out another three bags of jelly babies, Seven really finding a bag of marshmallows among the other junk he carried around in his trousers.</p><p>The ninth Doctor grabbed the axe that had emerged from Seven’s trouser pocket and was about to chop a small tree.</p><p>“What do you think you are doing, boy?” The third Doctor jumped to Nine’s side, grabbed his arm, and flung him on his back.</p><p>“What does it look like, old man? I’m chopping firewood.” Nine replied, confused both by the question and by finding himself buried under the older – or younger? – man.</p><p>“There’s enough dead wood around, I’d say. No need to play the lumberjack, don’t you think?”</p><p>“Agreed,” the first Doctor joined the conversation, “I’d say we've got enough young and strong lads around to collect some wood to make a nice fire!”</p><p>All the Doctors started to collect firewood. The eleventh Doctor was able to carry the most with his large arms. The fourth Doctor used his long scarf to bundle all the twigs and branches he and the fifth Doctor found, which made the second largest portion. The others added smaller portions, the thirteenth Doctor becoming distracted by tasting different plants and soil, the tenth Doctor carrying one single branch at a time, the other hand leisurely in his trouser pocket.</p><p>There was quite a bit of fighting going on about how to place the firewood most effectively, but in the end they all agreed that the fifth Doctor should do it as he had made the claim that someone who was able to understand the complicated rules of cricket was most likely able to decide on the most effective way to get a fire burning.</p><p>When he was done, he asked the other Doctors for fire. Twelve Doctors started to search all available pockets. The fifth Doctor sighed, reached into his pocket to get a flintstone and steel out. Then, he reached for his lapel and tore a small portion from the herb that stuck there.</p><p>“Celery can be used as tinder?” The second Doctor asked, surprised.</p><p>“Don’t be ridiculous, that’s fire herb from Asonguara 5,” Five replied, staring at the four incarnations that came before him. “You haven’t really thought I was carrying <em>celery</em> with me all the time? I chose the name <em>The Doctor </em>not <em>The Cook</em> if that detail has escaped you.”</p><p>The other eight incarnations snickered at the embarrassed faces of the first four Doctors.</p><p>Much to everybody’s surprise, Five had the fire burning in no time. They all gathered around it.</p><p>The thirteenth and twelfth Doctors managed to burn their first marshmallows pitch black so the seventh Doctor offered roasting marshmallows for everybody before the rest could ruin their whole supply.</p><p>The eight Doctor grabbed Seven’s hat.</p><p>“Oi!” Seven exclaimed.</p><p>“Safety precautions. You don’t want it to get burnt, it is straw, after all,” shrugged Eighth as he put the hat on.</p><p>The seventh Doctor sighed and handed the thirteenth Doctor the first perfectly roasted marshmallow.</p><p>“I think we can do with some music,” the second Doctor said, starting to play on his flute.</p><p>“Not a bad idea,” the twelfth Doctor agreed, pulling out his guitar.</p><p>“How did you manage to carry a whole guitar in your coat pocket? I never managed more than this recorder!” the second Doctor asked, respectfully.</p><p>“Easy!” Twelve replied, tuning his guitar, “Don’t forget I had centuries to try. And don’t ask about how many coats I ruined trying. Don’t talk to the TARDIS about it, she is still mad at me – and him,” he pointed to the eleventh Doctor beside him, who blushed.</p><p>He started to play a soulful, sad tune.</p><p>“Ah, Clara’s theme!” The eleventh Doctor said, staring dreamily to the stars.</p><p>“Who’s theme?” The twelfth Doctor frowned, obviously trying to make a connection in his mind that wasn’t there.</p><p>“Oh no, please, not that one! It makes me feel old. Like, at least four and a half billion years old!” The thirteenth Doctor complained. “And I don’t want a sad song, I want a happy one.”</p><p>“What I don’t understand,” the fifth Doctor said thoughtfully, studying a book he had pulled from his pocket, “is why all of this doesn’t create a major paradox. Even if just two or three incarnations meet, it is a big problem. And now we are <em>all </em>known Doctors in one place…”</p><p>“Oh, that’s easy, let me show you, young grasshopper,” the third Doctor said, pulling a watch from his pocket. When he opened it, it was a scale model of the universe. “Here, this is the Death Star that needs to be destroyed. This is the planet we are on. This is the lever of the universe. This planet, it is an artificially created counterpart to the Death Star. The moment the Death Star gets destroyed; this planet becomes impossible. And everything that is on it becomes impossible, too. Because the planet is impossible, everything that happens on here is impossible, too. And as everything that happens on here is impossible, suddenly, what is usually impossible, becomes possible. That’s why we can interact without creating a major paradox. Because we are a paradox already.”</p><p>The fifth Doctor shivered, if it was from the revelation, or from the cold that was creeping in was hard to tell. The fourth Doctor wrapped his scarf around his shoulder just in case he was freezing.  </p><p>“I still don’t understand,” the tenth Doctor got up, putting his right foot on the log he had sat on before. “If what you say is true, old man, how do we even exist? We should have become extinct the very moment the Death Star exploded!”</p><p>“Don’t you understand it?” The twelfth Doctor looked up from his guitar. “You, of all of us gathered around here, should best be able to understand it.” He changed the tune he was playing and looked to the second Doctor, who winked at him because he recognized the tune.</p><p>The tenth Doctor scratched the back of his head. Suddenly, realization dawned at him and there was a sparkle in his eyes.</p><p>“Oh yes!” He exclaimed. “Of course. Love. The love our companions have for us keeps us in existence! At least for the short moment they need to come here with the TARDIS!”</p><p>“Only partly right, my young friend,” the first Doctor said, using a stick to draw three intertwined hearts on the ground. “This whole rescue mission is about balance. The balance of the universe on a big scale, the balance of each one of us on the smaller scale. The love our companions have for us would be useless if it would not be matched by the same amount of love we have for them.” He drew a bigger heart around the three hearts.</p><p>The second Doctor started to play the <em>Marseillaise</em> on his flute, then changed it to another, very well-known tune, accompanied by the twelfth Doctor on the guitar who started singing, hesitantly at first.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>There's nothing you can do that can't be done</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Nothing you can sing that can't be sung</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Nothing you can say, but you can learn how to play the game</em>
</p><p>
  <em>It's easy!</em>
</p><p> </p><p>He grew more confident, his voice became a bit louder when he saw the other Doctors recognizing the song, nodding their heads or their feet, or both.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>Nothing you can make that can't be made</em>
</p><p>
  <em>No one you can save that can't be saved</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Nothing you can do, but you can learn how to be you in time</em>
</p><p>
  <em>It's easy!</em>
</p><p> </p><p>Now, they all joined in the chorus. Their voices ringing in the dead of night, under the starry sky, echoing from the mountains on this impossible planet.</p><p>Thirteen Doctors signing together.</p><p>Thinking about their respective companions.</p><p>Hoping they would come right on time.</p><p>No. <em>Knowing,</em> they would come right on time.</p><p><em>Knowing</em> it was mutual love that would save them all.</p><p>That it always had been love and would be love that saved the universe.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>All you need is love</em>
</p><p>
  <em>All you need is love</em>
</p><p>
  <em>All you need is love, love</em>
</p><p> </p><p>It could have been mere minutes; it could have been an eternity until the TARDIS with their companions materialized.</p><p>Of course, exactly right on time.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>Love is all you need</em>
</p><p> </p>
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